To feel upset me and DS have lost friends and it wasn't our fault

[WiseOwl24]

DS is 10.
Since age 5, he's been best friends with a girl in his class, let's call her Mia (not her real name). They've spent 5 years being each other's best friends. And in that time I've become really close to Mia's mum. 5 years of playdates, park after school, entire Sunday afternoons spent together, going out for lunch at weekends as families, I've had them round to mine as a family and hosted them on numerous occasions. Bought lovely birthday presents for them as they have done for us. What I'm trying to explain is, we ensured been close for 5 years.
A few months ago, out of the blue, DS came home from school upset saying that Mia had suddenly started saying mean things to him like "I hate you". "Every one in this school hates you". "Your face makes me want to vomit". "You've got no friends". All this was out of the blue. There had been no fall outs or anything.
I talked to Mia's mum and told her that Mia had been saying these things to DS, and I asked if there was a problem I didn't know about. Mia's mum said "Mia simply wouldn't say anything like that. Your DS is lying". She then called Mia over and said "Did you say these things?" Mia said "No" and Mia's mum turned to me and said "See. She says she didn't say it." Then stormed off without saying bye and made it clear she was furious with both me and DS - she literally glared at him with fury as she stormed off. He became worried and said "Why is Mia's mum angry with me?".
The next day at school, Mia ran up to DS and said "You're a snitch!!! I hate snitches!!! I hate you for snitching on me!!!". DS said "You said those things to me Mia, it really upset me, I thought we were good friends, I'm not a snitch, I just told my mum about it". Mia gave him more horrible personal insults and ran off.
The insults carried on for the next few weeks, with DS coming home regularly telling us that she was saying really horrible, nasty, spiteful, personal mean things to him at school, and she totally dumped hanging out with him and switched to a new friendship group of 'cool kids'. They are much older in their ways and their attitude than DS is, much more streetwise, sarcastic, mouthy, argumentative, trendy 10 year old boys walking round in teenage style clothes like ripped jeans and oversized skateboard tops and beanies with smartphones and using a lot of swearing in their general chat (I see them hanging around the park a lot outside of school). DS is nothing like this, he's still very much a child.
After a few weeks of Mia saying spiteful things to DS at school, I spoke to their class teacher about it and told her everything Mia was saying and I asked her to see if she could help with trying to sort out what was going on, because DS was coming home in tears about it. I imagined the teacher would get the 2 of them together and talk it through, knowing that they'd previously spent 5 years as best friends. Instead, the teacher spoke to Mia alone and came down like a tonne of bricks. At pick up, she said to me "I've blasted Mia today for what she's said to your DS, I'm coming down on her like a tonne of bricks and I've told her I'll be watching her closely and I've told her you've spoken to me about her behaviour so that she can't lie about it and so that she knows we all know".
From that day on, Mia has never said another thing to DS, but equally she now just blanks him. He says "She looks through me at school like I'm air".
Likewise, Mia's mum has stopped talking to me and either blanks me on the school run or gives me sliitted eyed evil stares.
We've both lost good friends. Long standing friends who became family friends that we spent a lot of time with. Mia's mum constantly referred to my DS as "Mia's bestie" from age 5 to 10.
DS is asking me how it went from him and Mia being best friends, to Mia turning against him literally overnight without anything bad having happened between them, no fall out, nothing.
He's asking me about it a lot and says he's really upset about what has happened and that he thought he and Mia were close friends.
I don't know how to explain things to him, because I literally don't get it. I don't understand what has happened.
I've never encountered anything like this before!
AIBU to feel upset that we've both lost close friends without either of us having actually done anything wrong?
How do I advise and explain to DS when I myself don't understand Mia's behaviour after years of them having a happy friendship where Mia used to actively seek out and love my DS, and ditto Mia's mum towards me?

It is very normal at this age for friendships to change.

It's unusual for children's friendships to last for many many years - it's more normal that they have fallings out and fallings in.
Most parents of 7-11 year olds will have experienced their child coming home and saying "I hate X she's so horrible" and the next day "X and me are best friends forever".

You and your DS should probably focus on developing a range of friendships with both boys and girls. That way when the inevitable falling outs happen he has other friends to play with.

This sounds really tough for both of you. Sometimes, I find, you just need to tell the truth and treat your child as an adult.
Tell him that sometimes people do things that are unexpected and friends let you down. We should do our best to understand them and forgive them but we can never really know why people do and say things that are hurtful. The best thing we can do is to have a conversation with them and find out if we upset them in any way but, if it doesn't work, we just have to accept that the friendship is over, forgive and move on. In time, they may realise their mistake and apologise. We can then decide whether to accept the apology and continue the friendship or whether to accept the apology but distance ourselves from the person anyway.

You poor things! Unfortunately, children can be pretty brutal about ending friendships, especially when social status comes into it and they start to become more aware of that. If Mia has been drawn into wanting to be in the cool gang, she may have felt that, to be accepted, she has to be seen to reject and dislike anyone who's not in the cool gang. This kind of thing is not uncommon. As for Mia's mum... well, parents will often react very angrily and cut off contact with anyone who criticises their child, rather than believe their child has done anything wrong. I hope your ds finds another, nicer friend!

I know that this isn't what you want to hear but you and your ds are better off finding out what sort of people Mia and her mum are now and getting out before that little madam gets worse and drags him into even more drama because in her mum's eyes Mia will never be wrong it will always be someone else who's to blame, and we all know what sort of brat that creates

Well, surely this suggests that in fact you haven’t lost two good friends, your son was just the victim of the kind of messy and upsetting friendship switch that sometimes happens with young children, and you realised that your friendship with the other child’s mother was purely situational, and didn’t survive the fallout?

An actual friend would have been concerned and promised to talk privately to their child to figure out why she’d turned against your DS. I had a not dissimilar situation earlier this year with my DS, aged 11, and talked to four parents in his friendship group, all of whom I also considered friends. They talked to their children, and the behaviour stopped.

ah, sorry this is happening to you both x I would say at this age, friendship groups can really change. Hormones, growing up at different rates etc. My own DS had a best pal since nursery, and come P7 (Scotland, he was around 10) suddenly the besties were no more. his friend was saying harsh things, and excluding him. He was very upset and found it hard to navigate. I did tell his class teacher, but she was great, and said she'd keep an eye, as DS was very worried about being seen as having 'told'.
They have now worked it through themselves, and are OK, but not besties. They are up at high school now anyway, so that will shake things up for most friendship groups.

I'd suggest encouraging other friendships if you can. And obv, the mum will 'side' with her own child, and might be embarrassed? I found that my DS' besties' mum hadn't been aware of how bad it had been, and I guess, from her perspective, it hadn't been. Her child hadn't been at home in tears after all.

hope things improve soon x

I think you need to be honest with your poor son. You can say I don’t know what motivated her to do this but sometimes people do and let you down. Also explain that when people are growing up this is even more common. It looks to me like Mia wanted to join the cool kids but didn’t know how to tell your son.

are there other children you can help your son develop a friendship with?

it is ok to show your son that you are also hurt, he will look to you so model being hurt but making other friendships and moving on.

It's happens all the time.

10 is usually the age kids develop very differently in regards to puberty and emotional development, hormones and trying out new things.

Sometimes that means they become complete arseholes in the process until they realise it doesn't make you friends. And at 10yo that sort of behaviour won't get as much short shrift as it would older or even adulthood because the other kids don't have the emotional intelligence, confidence and language to call it out.

But I have to say - it's really nice to hear of a school take an absolute no nonsense approach to bullying. And obviously it's worked because she's shut up.

Just tell your ds that life is for having a hide variety of friends from all walks of life. As he grows up he'll meet people who become short term friends and some long term.
Forget this relationship and spend time with your other family friends.

Maybe get ds into sos e kind of club to meet other people outside of school.

But he had to learn as well you can't control another persons behaviour - just your reaction to it.

Have you posted all this before?

If not it must indeed be a common problem, right down to the exact behaviour of the friend's mother and the reactions of all concerned.

You haven't bothered lost osw friends though. You have both lost bad friends. Use it as an opportunity to teach him what a friendship shouldn't look like and it will stand him in good stead.

I don’t think the mom was your good friend to begin with. She was just a school mum friend

Of course it's very common

Aged 5 - 10 is a huge length of time to be "best friends". Kids change. Friendships move on

I was always careful not to openly criticise my children's friends, knowing that whatever I said might be repeated

My line was "at your age, people are still working out how to behave and how to be good friends to people. I encourage you to focus on spending time with people who bring out the best in you and you feel good when you're with them"

Also, I think you have confused "mum of my child's friend" with "friend in my own right". In the past, I spent lots of time with my kids' friends' parents, really enjoyed their company, but when the kids moved on, the friendships with parents drifted. And, that's OK

So, in your shoes, if a similar situation arises, I'd probably encourage DS to let Mia drift and focus on finding new / better / other friendships, rather than trying to salvage an old friendship with Mia that's run its course

At that age, friendships change. Puberty strikes some sooner than others. My ds' best friend suddenly started showing him pictures of naked girls. Ds told him not to, that he wasn't interested, and the friendship ended.

There's nothing you can do to turn the clock back.

Wholeheartedly agree with this. Of course its hurtful but this is very common with young kids and her mum does not sound like someone you want to be friends with if she is enabling bratty behaviour like this in her daughter.

Agree with PP, you have not lost a "good friend" you've lost a "bad friend" and if this is how she behaves her daughter is only going to become more bratty as she gets older.

Chalk this up to experience and model to your son that just because someone behaves like this it isnt the end of the world, he can absolutely make new, better friends who will treat him well. Its far better he isnt around kids like this anyway and part of developing healthy boundaries is to recognise when someone isnt treating you well and to not just blithely accept that.

IMO nothing good ever comes from going to the other mum. I would have had a word with the teacher about the mean behaviour from Mia and then explained to ds that people change and friendships change. Then I’d distance myself from the mum.

i know this is no help this time but it might help if a similar issue happens again

I feel like you need to watch inside out 2. It sounds like she decided he was part of her childhood and she wants to leave all of that (and him) behind.

Friendships change. An adult friendship that was totally dependent on the children's friendship was always a vulnerable one.

My best friends son and my son went to infant school together, they walked to school on the first day hand in hand. Then never played with each other again at school . We are still best friends, we didn't try and force friendship on our children

Totally agree with all of this. This was my approach. I give gentle guidance but don't police friendships.

Can you encourage your son to explore new friendships?

I'm not meaning here to make sweeping generalisation just from my own observations. My kids and youngest nieces and nephews gen, I've seen how the girls tend to make new friend groups as they get older and may stick with 1 or 2 older friends into teens, whereas the boys are all still in their big friend groups from primary with a couple of new additions from secondary (normally with a sport, musical instrument or video game common interest)
It'sgood to have mixed sex friend groups, but for the sake of your son maybe suggest extending friend group to other boys too.
I've always put it down to differing rates of maturity

Mia has behaved badly but like many children. It's not uncommon to indulge in a spot of childish bullying. The school was right to come down on it like a ton of bricks. Bullying must not be tolerated and a "friendly" chat isn't the right way to deal with it at this age. That said, Mia is still young and so this could have been dealt with without too many problems had all the adults been on board.

The problem here is the adults. Mia's mother has facilitated her in bullying your son. If my DS was accused of bullying, I certainly wouldn't be burying my head in the sand because I'm not a deluded parent who thinks my child can do no wrong.

Your priority needs to be (and is, I'm sure) your son. I'd just be telling anyone who asked that Mia was bullying your son and her mum was ok with that, hence why you're no longer friends.

Some parents find it very hard to accept that their dc are not perfect. Sounds like Mia's mum is one of those.

Not much you can do but widen your friendship circle.

100% this! ⬆️

YANBU, although the teacher handled it very well I think. It wouldn't have been appropriate to have a meeting between your son and his bully as if it were a mutual falling out.

You and your DS just have to accept that some people are fickle and nasty, and it sucks. You have to try to pick yourself up and find other friends who aren't in Mia's "cool kid" clique. Not that you'd probably want your DS hanging around with the tryhard rebel types - they're dickheads at 10 years old and will probably still be dickheads when their own kids are loitering in the local park swearing!

We had a similiiar thing, except the friend in question turned a group of girls against DD. They made up some quite serious tales, told their parents and my DD wasn't believed as it was the word of 5 girls against 1. DS had seen that they were lying. The parents of these girls were my close friends and accused me of having blind faith in my apparently vicious child, within weeks we were ostracised in a small village, DD was labelled as a trouble maker at school. It was an awful time. We fortunately moved away (not for that reason).
Years and years later, DD found herself sitting next to one of the group on a bus. The girl admitted she felt bad about what had happened, her home life had been awful at the time and she ended up in foster care - none of us had a clue. She had been too scared to go against the ringleader and have her school life made miserable too.

I often read threads on here, where mums are told their child must be lying when a group of other kids turn against them and they are the lone voice. But after our experience I know this isn't always (often?) the case.